Fix a 5* -- Episode 7: Archangel Flops

Whelp, dealing with some work and home extra stuff put this on the backest of burners on the backest of stoves in the backets of kitchens... so you get it now.

5* Archangel

Quick Recap:

Blue - 11 AP to deal damage to the target and stun. Passive element deals damage to enemies that are airborne and stuns them.

Green - 10 AP to deal damage and destroy some random enemy AP

Black - 7 AP to throw out some countdowns in a selected color. They deal damage when they expire and in the meantime, the enemy team can't gain AP in the selected color.

The Breakdown and My Suggestions:

Niche. That's the key here. In the right circumstances, Archangel can be helpful, though I'd never call him needed.

Blue - I like damage and stuns. What I don't like is when they are crazy expensive. 2* Storm does AOE and stuns longer for the same AP and the damage dealt isn't even substantially more considering he's a 5*! Let's let him stun the target an another enemy and up that damage. OR bring down that cost in a big way. Otherwise he's being outshined by 2*s, 4*s (like Bishop) and even other 5*s like Cable. Otherwise it feels like you are kinda paying for that passive.

Green - The description says paralyzing, but there's no stun here. AP destruction is almost pointless in this game. By the time a team is spending 10 green, the opponent is probably well on their way to whatever they are gonna do and because it's random, it's just not getting it done. The damage being single-target is 5* level, but at this cost doesn't seem worth it. I'd rather see him do either an AOE stun and some damage, or do a thing where he grabs a target and drags them airborne with him. He goes up for 1 turn and the opponent goes up for 2 or 3 so when Warren lands, he then stuns+hits that same character with his blue passive.

Black - This probably needs fortified tiles. If you're going to spend the AP for this effect and to get the damage you have to wait up to 5 turns, you gotta have some kind of protection for those things that doesn't rely on a teammate. Let's see another passive on this guy from black that creates a 3-turn repeater. When it hits 0, Archangel goes airborne for a turn. When he comes back, he smashes someone for free with either his blue or green. To get free firings of his powers, I'd say this is where a 3-turn repeater would be needed to avoid things getting straight crazy, but when I think about Thorkoye and Gritty, I think Warren and someone to protect his repeater (that I've laid out) would make him a really interesting character. And the delay between hits isn't so slow to be pointless because he can fire his powers via AP should he acquire it.

Comments

Blue: To my mind, the passive is the core part of this power, so I'd keep the active not too powerful. But make it pretty cheap, probably down to 6. Or maybe have the active generate Strikes, if the green gets a stun.

Green: I don't have any green covers for mine, so didn't realize it was so different from the 3* version. To bring it closer to the description, I think I might go for AoE damage and a random stun, or Team damage and stun someone random. Angle of Attack's Active would probably want to get changed in that case, tho, because giving him two different stuns seems like a bad idea to me.

I like the "cannot gain AP in this colour by any means" mechanic on his black, which I don't think any other Character (bar his 3*, of course) has anything quite like. So I'd like to keep that in some form. Maybe shift to something a little more like Squirrel Girl's green or Ant-Man's yellow, where they do damage or something each Turn rather than a big hit when they expire. Those characters also get like 4-5 of the Countdowns, so maybe bump up the number of them for Archangel rather than Fortifying? Or would that make him pair too well with Characters who could fortify them?

I'd make Captain Marvel great, especially her airborne ability, so AA is worth bringing as a counter not only against Vulture...

Seriously though, he's almost fine, just a cheaper blue and fortified black CDs would go a long way. Though, with Kitty's purple around...

For a more complicated tweak, I've seen an additional change proposed before to have him choose placement of both tiles on black ability, possibly two different colors.

I am a little disappointed he doesn't go airborne himself.

Anyway, my dream AA buff might be something like this...

blue 6 AP - deal damage and stun the target for 1 turn. If the target is already stunned, send them airborne for 2 turns.(passive) - at the start of the turn, deal damage to any airborne enemies and stun them for 1 turn.

black 8 AP - same, only CDs are fortified and upon reaching 0, in addition to the damage part, they generate 2 black AP.(passive) - when returning from airborne, reduce a friendly CD to 0, targeting air superiority tiles first.

Thinking a little more about making AA airborne, it would require quite a bit of extra work, because currently both his blue (passive part) and black (CD present on the board) are suspended while he's airborne. (I've tested the 2nd one with Carol, reducing his black so it can block AP for both teams, then sending him up and matching a color with Aerial Superiority CD on it. He didn't prevent AP gain.) It must be possible to make it work though, Team-up CDs already continue ticking even with the whole team incapacitated, and there's the flying pig ability too.

Anyway, here's a revised version. No accelerating A.S. CDs this time, since they'd continue ticking whether AA is airborne or not. And their job is primarily AP denial (I think?), so better to leave them as long as possible. Instead he can help someone else's CD (like Hawkeye or Goblin or Gambit). Also added ability to add attack and strike tiles to help interaction with Kitty or Carol for instance, which I feel is fine as both of those would take some time to produce. Green passive would also work with a lot of lower tier characters which could be fun for transitioning rosters with half covered 5*s.

Some_Other_Name (passive) - while airborne, AA is immune to stun or damage. At the start of the turn, if there are airborne enemies (other than AA), stun them for 1 turn and deal damage to them, otherwise consume 5 blue AP and generate 1 AP in non blue AP pools. When his team has less than 5 blue AP, AA lands and this power reverts back to Angle of Attack.

Enemy Down (10 green AP) - does damage and drains (up to) X AP from 2 random enemy AP pools. (passive) - for every N total AP drained or stolen by your team from the enemy in a match, AA creates an attack tile and resets the counter.

Aerial Superiority (7 black AP) - creates 2 CD tiles of a chosen color that prevent the enemy from gaining AP in it while they're on the board and sends AA airborne. These tiles continue to work and tick down each turn, even if AA is airborne. When the CD expire they deal damage and leave a strike tile. (passive) - when AA returns from being airborne, reduce a friendly CD other than Aerial Superiority ones to 0.

If his green and blue were cheaper he would be pretty good (not meta, but pretty useful). Lower the cost of his blue by 2AP and his green make it 6AP, with a bit lower damage (7K ?). His green needs to be fast so those 4AP less can make a difference.

He would still not be great, because passives are too strong in this game (Gritty ) but then he would be great with Okoye, or against very strong opponents in PvE.